Tag: environment

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Environment

As Light Falls

Lake Macbride from the North Shore Trail, May 27, 2023

Morning light illuminated this peninsula on Lake Macbride during my walk. One never knows how a multi-function mobile device will capture a photograph. I’m pleased with the results of this one.

The hard part is breaking away from preoccupations on a trail walk, to be aware of our surroundings enough to notice how light falls on the landscape. The results can be liberating. If the image comes out well, it’s a bonus. Increasingly, I seek the light on excursions off property.

Five of seven garden plots are planted, meaning I am running behind. Reasons have to do with weather, and with the pace at which I work. A five or six-hour shift with breaks every hour is what I can muster. Progress is steady, yet slow. Gardening is a tolerant activity and whatever one can do is better than the alternative. I do what I can.

Already there is a harvest. Leafy green vegetables, lettuce, spring onions, radishes, and herbs. I mixed fresh greens with last year’s frozen ones to make spring vegetable broth for canning. It is time to use up the freezer to make room for the new harvest. Spring broth is always best so I noted the month on the lids.

I forgot potatoes at the wholesale store so I drove to town on Saturday. My neighbor, who owns the grocery store, was there and he thanked me for the San Marzano tomato seedlings I gave him. I had extra. The grocery store wasn’t busy. Organized locals got their Memorial Day weekend shopping done by Friday. We had a good chat about tomatoes, gardening, and people in the community. The value of the trip was no small potatoes, although I got some of those, too.

My spouse is at her sister’s home for the week, so I’m on my own. As I age, I dislike being alone. While freedom to cook how I like is a perquisite of her absence, meal preparation takes only a small part of each day.

Today is the annual firefighters breakfast in town and I plan to open it up then move on to garden and yard tasks before the ambient temperature gets too hot. If all goes well, I’ll mulch tomatoes (which means mowing the lawn), build a brush pile, and trim around the foundation of the home to prepare the spot for the new air conditioner.

The flags are up at Oakland Cemetery, signifying local veterans who died. The Memorial Day service moved to the new veterans memorial in town. I’ll stop by the cemetery on my way to breakfast and see how light falls on the graves and flags. I know many of the names. I was active with many of them when they were living. That, too is part of aging in America.

Flags at Oakland Cemetery
Categories
Environment

Earth Day 2023

Trail walking at Lake Macbride State Park on April 21, 2023.

There is an official Earth Day website which indicates how far the observance has come since 1970. In addition, there are proclamations by governing bodies, festivals supporting “Mother Earth,” and oil and gas companies touting their actions to capture CO2 emissions and recycle plastics. I’m not sure any of this helps reduce the impact of humans on our shared environment, yet it may be better than a stick in the eye.

Exploitation of the environment has been basic to civilization, especially in the settling of North America. In the early days, North America was about land speculation and extraction of wealth from the so-called “newly discovered” place. It began with production of sugar, rice, cotton, tobacco and indigo, which required cheap land and abundant labor in the form of slaves or indigent white folks forced to migrate from Britain. We had and continue to operate an extractive economy supporting exports and consumers. Few want to give up their handheld mobile device or other modern conveniences to help save the planet, so the extraction part of the economy may grow along with the burgeoning population. By 2100 there are projected to be 10.4 billion people on our blue-green sphere, according to the United Nations.

People should do more to improve the environment than what each of us can do individually. It seems obvious that everyone: every business, organization, government, and individual must pull together to solve the climate crisis. Importantly, our political system must take the lead in climate action, regardless of the political outlook of individual elected officials. This holds true in authoritarian regimes where there are no elected representatives. When I wrote “everyone,” that’s what I meant.

What should we do? That’s an easy answer: support large scale, organized actions that will make a difference. If regulators say we should reduce CO2 emissions in new automotive products, then support it. If the Gulf of Mexico dead zones are a problem, then regulate the chemicals and processes that dump into the Mississippi River watershed. If our air is polluted by emissions from coal and natural gas-powered electricity generation, then convert to wind and solar. Solutions exist to clean up our air, water and land pollution. There are processes to develop new and better solutions to the climate crisis.

Every day I do something small to help mitigate the worst effects of the climate crisis. I reduce water usage, adjust the thermostat a few degrees, turn off lights when not in a room, and minimize the amount of driving I do in our personal vehicle. Every day is Earth Day in our home, so the annual remembrance is not that important to me. What matters more is finding common ground to enable more solutions, reduce pollution, and clean up our land, air and water.

Spend a few minutes reading the Earth Day website, located here. Then talk to someone you know about how important it is we take action today to rescue our much abused planet and make a livable home for our civilization going forward. It could make our lives better in the process.

Categories
Sustainability

Onion Planting 2023

Onion plot 2023.

It was 64 degrees at 3 a.m. Saturday morning. That’s weird.

A gardener contends with weather, so temperature anomalies come with the work. The vegetables I plant in my Midwestern garden have a wide range of tolerance to climate, moisture and light. They have been bred and propagated because of those qualities.

Potatoes and onions should be safe to plant now, and I did. I direct seeded spinach when putting in the onion sets. Garlic is doing fine after being uncovered from winter. There are many apple and pear blossoms in the early formation stage. Pollinators are already abundant, seeking the early purple flowers and dandelions in the lawn. The greenhouse is packed with seedlings. What could be wrong?

Regardless of weird weather, Spring has arrived and it would be difficult not to feel a part of it. I can see leaves on deciduous trees bud and burst into foliage in front of me. All is well in the garden, or at least as good as it gets.

What will weird weather mean this growing season? I don’t know. I am, however, both concerned, and getting used to it. The overall trend does not look good.

If you aren’t following Bill McKibben on the climate crisis, you likely should be. In yesterday’s edition of his substack, The Crucial Years, he wrote,

This week’s Fort Lauderdale rainstorm was, on the one hand, an utter freak of nature (storms ‘trained’ on the same small geography for hours on end, dropping 25 inches of rain in seven hours; the previous record for all of April was 19 inches) and on the other hand utterly predictable. Every degree Celsius that we warm the planet means the atmosphere holds more water vapor; as native Floridian and ace environmental reporter Dinah Voyles Pulver pointed out, “with temperatures in the Gulf running 3 to 4 degrees above normal recently, that’s at least 15% more rainfall piled up on top of a ‘normal’ storm.”

Get ready for far more of it; there are myriad scattered signs that we’re about to go into a phase of particularly steep climbs in global temperature. They’re likely to reach impressive new global records—and that’s certain to produce havoc we’ve not seen before.

The Crucial Years, We’re in for a stretch of heavy climate by Bill McKibben, April 15, 2023.

McKibben is not one to use hyperbole. He must realize the downside of doing so. In social media, instead of seeing McKibben’s work promoted, the right-wing spokesmodel for all things cultural was getting attention. Even climatologist and geophysicist Michael Mann snarked about the Georgia congresswoman’s comments.

It is getting difficult to follow the scientific discussion of the climate crisis. Partly, major news media find it too dull a subject for headlines. Partly, the right-wing media noise machine drowns out serious topics in public discourse. Yet we notice temperature anomalies when they happen, and wonder for how long we can go on the way we are.

While we wonder, we’ll need onions, apples and spinach.

Categories
Living in Society Writing

Jobs Aren’t the Issue

Working the Garden

The overlooked part of President Joe Biden’s remarks about the January jobs report is this, “As my dad used to say, ‘A job is about a lot more than a paycheck. It’s about your dignity.’”

Make no mistake that Democrats should tout the achievement in jobs growth accomplished during the Biden administration.

Next week, I’ll be reporting on the state of the Union.  But today — today, I’m happy to report that the state of the Union and the state of our economy is strong.

We learned this morning that the economy has created 517,000 jobs just last month — more than half a million jobs in just the month of January. 

And in addition, we also learned that we — there were half a million more jobs created last year than we thought, so the January report is updated.  I mean, excuse me, the December report is updated.

Add that all up, it means we created 12 million — 12 million jobs since I took office.  That means we have created more jobs in two years than any presidential term, than any time, in two years.

That’s the strongest two years of job growth in history by a longshot.

Remarks by President Biden on the January Jobs Report, Feb. 3, 2023.

I’m more restrained in my reaction to the jobs numbers because business continues to focus on deregulation, profit, and shareholders rather than employees. Having a job is good, yet what kind of work is it, and how long will it last? There are unresolved issues between capital and labor.

By the time I entered the workforce in 1968, the post-war economic boom was ending. We didn’t understand it at the time, yet business had resisted progress with workforce since the post-Civil War era when a few people — John D. Rockefeller, J.P. Morgan, Andrew Carnegie, Cornelius Vanderbilt, Jay Gould, E.H. Harriman, Henry Clay Frick, and others — tried to capture the entire economy to serve their own interests. While the Gilded Age capitalists, or Robber Barons as they are better known, were beat back through regulation, large corporate interests are again dominating the industrial landscape in today’s society. A small number of companies push the limits of anti-trust regulations to grow big and prosper anew. The same regulations that broke the monopolies.

After WWII, there was a business movement to create “good jobs.” Companies like General Electric, Kodak, General Motors and Coca-Cola were large scale employers who valued putting returning G.I.s back to work and created what today seems like exceptional benefits packages. Profit-sharing, bonuses, pensions, health care, and even a “guaranteed income” program were all part of generous perquisite packages for loyal employees. These actions were partly self-serving, i.e. to gain employee loyalty and support profitable business enterprises, yet these capitalists viewed employees differently than we do today. Growth in wage workers would fuel a consumer society bursting at the gills in the 1950s.

It is difficult to pinpoint one villain in the conflict between employers and employees in the post-Reagan era. In any case, I point to human resources management consultants. The 40th president set the tone by firing air traffic controllers during the PATCO strike. Much less flashy was the hiring of consultants and implementing ideas the main goal of which was to drive out human resource costs. Whatever romantic attachment to so-called “good jobs” persisted was underscored by the quiet changes by human resource consultants to remove the expense of employees from business operations large and small.

Yes, we should congratulate Joe Biden and company for the what they did to get people back to work after the coronavirus pandemic. At the same time, we should encourage the administration to tax business fairly, act on the climate crisis, and do what’s right for employees and retirees in a rapidly changing business environment. Jobs aren’t the main issue in society today. Regulating business is.

Categories
Environment

Getting Beyond Coal

Move UI Beyond Coal, near Jessup Hall on the University of Iowa Pentacrest. Photo by the Author on Nov. 16, 2011.

In 2019, the University of Iowa signed a 50-year contract for a consortium of private companies to operate their coal-fired power plant and more. They should have phased out the coal plant and initiated a plan to transition to alternatives to provide the electricity and steam required. No one was listening to any of the advocates for shuttering the plant. They hadn’t been listening for years. It was an inside deal in an increasingly less than transparent state government.

In return for a $1.2 billion cash payment to fund an endowment, the university assumed different responsibilities regarding the facility. The consortium attorneys contend they didn’t understand their role and did not meet contractual obligations, according to the lawsuit. For Pete’s sake, not even three years in and there is a lawsuit? Shaking my head.

In November 2011, there was a demonstration at Jessup Hall on the University of Iowa Pentacrest urging then president Sally Mason to cease operation of the coal-fired power plant. We delivered a petition to her office. There were speeches on the steps of Jessup Hall. I gave a speech, among others.

Our deeds that day fell on deaf ears.

I remember when mass mobilizations and demonstrations could accomplish positive things in society. The best example was in 1974 when we drove Richard Nixon to resign from office as president. Those days are no more.

Instead of making social progress, big money politics of a wealthy consortium wielded their power to make more money. Filing a lawsuit is just part of the deal, even if the details over which they are suing should have been clarified well before a signature was inked.

Because the state, and the board of regents, is involved, taxpayers will ultimately pay for the suit. That’s not the future we had hoped for when we advocated for the University of Iowa to go beyond coal.

Categories
Environment

Climate Slog Begins

Sky during a January tornado warning. Two tornadoes touched down in Iowa County, the first winter tornadoes in 56 years.

There is a lot of climate-related stuff going on in Iowa. The presumption that made Iowa an agricultural center is there would be enough naturally occurring rain in the growing season to support our major crops of corn, soybeans, and hay. I’m not sure where winter tornadoes fit in. On Jan. 16, two tornadoes were sighted near Williamsburg, Iowa, the first winter tornadoes in 56 years.

There is an ongoing drought about which some local buddies and I talked on Tuesday. Our discussion centered around good yields with drought resistant seeds, pivot irrigation rigs found near Marengo, and the need to protect the Silurian aquifer where our village well draws its water. We shouldn’t want to become like western Nebraska where they are drawing down the Ogallala aquifer. Things appear to be akilter as far as atmospheric moisture and precipitation goes. Corn and beans won’t grow without rain.

It is important for our government get involved with mitigating the effects of climate change. Doing something significant is beyond the power of a single citizen or community. I wrote our U.S. House Representative this week to encourage what she’s doing already.

Congratulations on being assigned to the Committee on Energy and Commerce and for providing some history of the committee’s work in your last newsletter.

I’m writing today to encourage your work on the House Conservative Climate Caucus. I also note your participation at COP 26 and COP 27. Thank you for engaging in one of the most important issues facing our society.

While you and I may not always agree on how to approach climate solutions, I believe the science will out. If anything, you have repeated you believe in science-based solutions. I agree with that wholeheartedly.

Good luck in the 118th Congress. I’ll write again if I have any more specific requests.

Thank you for the opportunity to provide feedback.

Email to Congresswoman Mariannette Miller-Meeks on Jan. 16, 2023.

If I hear back, I’ll post the response here. I’m not hopeful she or her office will respond, as they did not respond to my last email in 2022.

With Republicans assuming the reins of government in Iowa, everything about addressing the climate crisis will be a slog. Because political work to gain more climate friendly representation during the last three cycles proved futile, we have to make do what what we have. That means staying in tune with what’s going on in the atmosphere and spreading the word as it is revealed. It will not be super-sexy work, yet it is what is needed and climate action takes a back seat to tax cuts for the wealthy.

I have confidence we’ll slog through it no matter how difficult.

Categories
Living in Society

Winter Solstice 2022

Apple Trees in Winter

At the moment of winter solstice, I hope to be returning home for my day trip. About an hour or so later, the first local snow of the coming winter storm is expected to fall. After arriving home, I’ll bunker in for the duration. It is forecast to be a typical Iowa blizzard. Let’s hope it is that.

Solstice is in the pantheon of end of year family holidays that began last Sunday with our wedding anniversary. Following today, there is Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, a birthday, New Year’s Eve, and New Year’s Day. Normally the holiday season would extend to Super Bowl Sunday, yet I no longer pay attention to the sporting event. January 1 is the end of the holidays.

We more note the passing days than celebrate them. After our child left Iowa in 2007, we haven’t often spent Christmas together. We settled for visits during this extended holiday season when they were able to come.

Before I started school, ours was a religious home. I lived with Mother and Father and with or near my maternal grandmother. She brought devotion to the Catholic Church along from her native Minnesota. Although she is reputed to have been excommunicated over her second marriage, Christmas, and more particularly Easter, remained important.

Father was not a religious man. He left a King James Bible with his name embossed on it. He presumably got it in his youth. Inside there is a hand-written note of uncertain authorship that begins: “America’s Stake in the Christian Home is a Stake in Christ.” There is also a note saying, “98% of truly Christian homes never broken by divorce.” If he believed that, it would have complicated the close relationship between members of our three-generational home during the 1950s.

He began to get religion after graduating from the Palmer College of Chiropractic. If he began a practice, he would need clients. Joining the Catholic Church, where Mother and Grandmother were already well-embedded, was a way to network among the faithful. When I discussed conversion at age 40 with him, it was a utilitarian matter. He hoped to identify people with needs for chiropractic adjustments. Father didn’t live long enough to join the Catholic Church or pass the state boards and begin a practice. The parish pastor noted his intentions toward conversion during the eulogy at his funeral Mass.

I don’t recall an exact moment when I lost the Catholic religion. I remained reasonably faithful through graduation from a Catholic high school. While my church attendance was less frequent at university, my faith was there. The bishop accepted me for study for the priesthood after graduation. I did not pursue it. While serving in the U.S. Army I attended church when we were on field maneuvers. After my discharge, I recall attending Mass in the church where I was baptized and by then the divide had grown too wide to bridge.

From the time of the Roman Empire through today, people celebrated Winter Solstice in difference cultures. Parts of Saturnalia fit right in with the Western idea of December holidays. As mentioned, I note the day and hope for a safe return from today’s trip.

There will be a lot to consider during the blizzard. I’m ready with gasoline for the generator, an extra stock of water, and plenty of food.

Religion is more on my mind in December than in other months. In a conversation with the local Catholic priest during a random meeting on the state park trail, I asked about reconciliation. Based on our conversation, it will not be possible. I’m okay with that.

For today, there is the winter solstice.

Categories
Living in Society

Holiday Travel 2022

Winter Travel

Word is in from the news media-meteorological information trust that a significant Midwestern winter storm is brewing for the days leading into Christmas. Our family is splitting up for the holidays and have travel plans. Because we are retired and flexible, we will comply with the media overlords and travel Wednesday. If I were still working outside home, I would travel when schedules permit. Military service instructed me life goes on regardless of weather conditions.

It snowed overnight yet only a dusting remains. A half hour with a broom will clear what the sky dropped. I’ll wait until sunrise to get that chore done. Otherwise, there is plenty of indoors work to accomplish today.

The last time I was alone on Christmas was after my arrival in Mainz, Germany. While I was being processed into our battalion they were on field maneuvers until the last days before the holiday. When they returned, everyone hurried to be with family and I was left alone. By then, I was 18 months into being a regular journal writer/diarist. I used the time alone for reflection:

Personal Journal
25 December 1975
Mainz, West Germany
Christmas

I have just spent the last few minutes waiting for water to come to a boil on the stove for tea. While waiting, I skipped through this journal, stopping every so often and reading random pages. It seems that what I have written at other times is sufficiently removed from me to permit my pursuit of authorship of literature. This is good.
The things I have read also pain me at times. The thought of a past once present now changed into memories.
As I sit today, Christmas, before my desk, I will not forget, I cannot forget myself when I am writing -- it soothes me by its connection with the past, direct, like looking through the space that I have traveled from the eternal point of view. Sehr gut.
I sit down, spreading ink on paper and what yields it? Ink on my small and ring fingers and a touch with the past.

I’m looking forward to Wednesday’s trip and getting off property for a couple of hours. In deference to the weather, I’ll stop to provision on the trip home. I won’t like being separated from everyone, but at least we have free video conferencing… and, of course, social media. When there is a small family, that’s how it goes some years. I’m okay with it once in a while. Wouldn’t want to make it a holiday tradition, though.

Categories
Environment

Eschewing Avocados

Avocado from Mexico.

It is my minority opinion that avocados should be avoided in the United States. Don’t buy them, don’t eat them. The fruit has become popular, and because of it, Mexican growers can’t keep up with demand. This creates a problem.

To meet surging demand in the U.S., farmers in Mexico have cut down swaths of forest in the western state of Michoacán, one of the most important ecosystems in the country. By some estimates, as many as 20,000 acres of forest — the area of more than 15,000 American football fields — are cut down each year and replaced with avocado plantations. The rapid expansion of orchards will threaten forests in Mexico for years to come.

The bad news about your avocado habit by Benji Jones, Vox, Feb. 13, 2022.

Dishes like guacamole, avocado toast and smoothies taste delicious. Refined oil from the fruit is popular among foodies and nutritionists because of its unsaturated fats. By one estimate, sports fans eat through 105 million pounds of avocados on Super Bowl Sunday. The deforestation problem is directly related to such consumer demand.

The immediate catalyst for this post was a project to reduce my cookbook collection. I found many recipes for guacamole and felt we needed a reminder to moderate consumption and address the deforestation their popularity causes. I can hear long-time readers asking, “Didn’t you cover this before?” Yes, I did in the post titled, “Can Hipsters Stomach the Truth about Avocados from Mexico?” Not much has changed.

What can consumers do about deforestation which creates high-margin avocado plantations? Solutions are complicated. Ecosystem Marketplace outlines some of the challenges here. In the meanwhile, go light on the guacamole and avocado toast, and find another oil for cooking.

It is something we can do to contribute to efforts to solve the climate crisis.

Categories
Living in Society

Costs of Development

View of Trail Ridge Estates on Thursday, Sept. 30, 2021.

SOLON, Iowa. — It is no surprise a year into development of Trail Ridge Estates by the Watts Group additional public costs are being identified. The first is environmental.

The Cedar Rapids Gazette reported yesterday the Watts Group was fined $3,000 by Iowa Department of Natural Resources for pumping construction runoff into a storm drain that leads to Lake Macbride. I note the Watts Group built the storm drain after developing what was previously a farm field. Such environmental pollution is part and parcel of a development this size. The lake is already feeling pressure from development and this additional loss of farmland has an impact. The matter was settled by the parties in a consent order signed Oct. 25.

What will cost more is the recently announced $25 million school bond expected to go to voters this spring. Trail Ridge Estates will contribute directly to area growth and the requirement for more classroom space in the school system.

The district, like the town of Solon, has seen a steady increase in enrollment since 2014, and anticipates planned housing developments — with another 500 new residential units — to bring additional families in to the district. Solon schools’ current enrollment is 1,450 and is expected to increase by about 350 to 750 students over the next 10 years, depending on how quickly new housing developments take shape.

Solon schools plan $25 million bond, Cedar Rapids Gazette, Nov. 28, 2022.

The farm field in development was planted mostly in corn and soybeans, so converting it into housing is no significant loss to the food system.

Trail Ridge Estates was annexed to the City of Solon and will contribute to significant growth, maybe 50 percent more than the 2020 U.S. Census count of 3,018. What may get missed in this news is the area is evolving from what it was when we moved here into something new: a more expensive, environmentally compromised place to live. While promoters of the bond issue say it won’t increase taxes, how can it not increase expense as the school system grows to match population? The district will eventually see increased costs as a result of this development.

We will welcome more information on the bond issue. I plan to study it closely yet will likely vote for the bond. Public schools are endemic to thriving communities and we want our nearby city to thrive.